An interesting Hamilton dryer concept design by Brooks Stevens from 1941. I wonder it the top opens or you load thru the front porthole. Jeff
Hamilton Dryer Concept
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Brooks Stevens redesigned Studebakers in their last years,along with a lot of designs for American Motors.
Great picture!
kennyGF
Great picture!
kennyGF
scott55405
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I don't know, but shame they never made it. That is a very fun-looking machine!
Looks like a bubble gum machine or a radio from the late 30s or 40s.
Hamilton Dryer Concept
This looks like a real awsome design. I could also picture this as a washer with tons of splashing.
Peter
This looks like a real awsome design. I could also picture this as a washer with tons of splashing.
Peter
westytoploader
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Very neat concept; would LOVE to see something like that today! I wonder what provides the drying action?
SactoTeddyBear
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Re: Drying Method:
It looks to me like with the Bubble Top, that maybe it has some kind of Blower that would be sitting behind a Mesh Screen at the Bottom of the Drying area. It would Heated Air to flow the Laundry up towards the Bubble Top and somehow possibly even have the Fan at a 45-Degree Angle, to allow the Laundry to Circulate around the whole inside area.
I wonder if this concept actually had a Model made to try to see how it operated actually and how effective the Drying would be of Auto/Timing and Temperature?
Peace and Fun Times with interesting Laundry Inventions, Steve
SactoTeddyBear...
It looks to me like with the Bubble Top, that maybe it has some kind of Blower that would be sitting behind a Mesh Screen at the Bottom of the Drying area. It would Heated Air to flow the Laundry up towards the Bubble Top and somehow possibly even have the Fan at a 45-Degree Angle, to allow the Laundry to Circulate around the whole inside area.
I wonder if this concept actually had a Model made to try to see how it operated actually and how effective the Drying would be of Auto/Timing and Temperature?
Peace and Fun Times with interesting Laundry Inventions, Steve
SactoTeddyBear...
mrcleanjeans
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Mister Bubble
That would have been a great looking design for an impeller dishwasher,could've been called "The Dishwashing Dome".
That would have been a great looking design for an impeller dishwasher,could've been called "The Dishwashing Dome".
Thanks, Jeff! I wonder if behind the center escutcheon there was the hub for the curved "clothes stiring vanes" that operated around the spherical drying chamber like the one-dimensional stirers in pop corn machines stir the kernals in the bottom of the kettle? The major flaw with this superficial drawing is that the heated air would have to come in low. That caused early dryers with the heat source under the drum to scorch clothes, but if this was designed so that the heat blew from side-to-side, that problem might be eliminated, but I don't see how it would operate with the Hamilton "Carrier Current" type of drying.
In a Hotpoint dream kitchen during the"Golden Age of Appliances," they showed a vertical dryer that had paddles on a path that traveled a tall, narrow cabinet that brought clothes up maybe 5 or 6 feet and let them tumble back down. Don't ask about things getting caught in this, or the lint problems. It was a dream kitchen, not a nightmare.
In a Hotpoint dream kitchen during the"Golden Age of Appliances," they showed a vertical dryer that had paddles on a path that traveled a tall, narrow cabinet that brought clothes up maybe 5 or 6 feet and let them tumble back down. Don't ask about things getting caught in this, or the lint problems. It was a dream kitchen, not a nightmare.
Wow that is too cool! Now wouldn't that be a find, I love the levers, I wonder if it has an cool down at the end of the cycle?
Perhaps not very functional, but what a beauty! Thank you for sharing the picture Jeff.
Trouble!
This reminds me of the popcorn popper they had at Sears' candy counter (remember that?) years ago. They had the best popcorn and it was fun to watch it shoot up the tube and fall down the glass dome.
The gas valve looks to have been some sort of adjustable flame - like a range burner.
Jetcone! Get out those patent books and spectacles, we need some more info!
This reminds me of the popcorn popper they had at Sears' candy counter (remember that?) years ago. They had the best popcorn and it was fun to watch it shoot up the tube and fall down the glass dome.
The gas valve looks to have been some sort of adjustable flame - like a range burner.
Jetcone! Get out those patent books and spectacles, we need some more info!
Looks like one of those older bread machines-my friend had one that looked like that dryer-one day he was using it-and it fell from the counter breaking its glass dome.I was trying to remember the brand.You could watch the bread dough being kneaded and baked thru the dome.
Or could this be another design for some sort of juke box-you could watch the record changer thru the dome.
Or could this be another design for some sort of juke box-you could watch the record changer thru the dome.
Designgeek
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Very interesting design concept there, one of the most interesing appliance designs I've seen in recent months if not longer.
Here's my wild guess as to how that one works.
You load the damp laundry in via the porthole in the front. The bottom of the machine is another hemisphere like the top dome, but is made of steel and is perforated at the bottom and around the upper circumference, just below the glass dome.
At the very center of the bottom is the opening where the warm air comes in at high velocity like the output of the blower port on a vacuum cleaner. At the periphery of the bottom hemisphere, just below where the top hemisphere begins, are the holes where the air exits. The air coming up from the bottom causes the load to fluff up into the upper dome, where it falls outward as it comes back down. This produces a tumbling action. As each article of clothing comes back down, it falls past the point where the air exits (thereby allowing lint to be sucked out), and slides down the sides of the lower hemisphere back to the bottom where the incoming warm air catches it and blows it back up to the top again, and so on.
While this is going on, the evaporated moisture at first causes the upper dome to fog up visibly. But as the load becomes more dry, the upper dome de-fogs, which the user can see as an indication that the clothes are drying. By the time the load is dry, it's moving more quickly and is taking up more room in the upper dome as it fluffs up, almost like popcorn. At the end of the cycle, you open the porthole in front to remove the load.
A few reasons why this wouldn't have caught on in the market. One, depending on the velocity of the air circulation, lighter articles could get stuck to the air exit holes by way of the exiting air pressure (think of something stuck at the end of a vacuum cleaner nozzle). Two, these things would require large boxes to store and ship, so they would take up more space in a warehouse and might also be susceptible to breakage of the dome, both factors adding cost. And less important but still relevant, three, unlike dryers with a flat top surface, you couldn't use the top as a counter or work surface to fold clothes or store a load from the washer before putting it into the dryer.
But even so, it would be an interesting idea to try to resurrect, especially with modern materials for the dome. And of course it could be done in an electric version as well as gas. It would be easy enough to make a scale model of this to test the design principles (particularly the air flow); someone here should try it. The absence of a rotating drum would make it quite simple: only a heater and a high-velocity blower. I'm willing to bet that the air wouldn't even need to be heated super-hot for this to work well; warm might be sufficient. (I'm tempted to build a test model myself, it's so simple; but for the lack of free time...)
Does this sound reasonable, or does anyone else have a guess as to how this works? Or is there patent information available?
Here's my wild guess as to how that one works.
You load the damp laundry in via the porthole in the front. The bottom of the machine is another hemisphere like the top dome, but is made of steel and is perforated at the bottom and around the upper circumference, just below the glass dome.
At the very center of the bottom is the opening where the warm air comes in at high velocity like the output of the blower port on a vacuum cleaner. At the periphery of the bottom hemisphere, just below where the top hemisphere begins, are the holes where the air exits. The air coming up from the bottom causes the load to fluff up into the upper dome, where it falls outward as it comes back down. This produces a tumbling action. As each article of clothing comes back down, it falls past the point where the air exits (thereby allowing lint to be sucked out), and slides down the sides of the lower hemisphere back to the bottom where the incoming warm air catches it and blows it back up to the top again, and so on.
While this is going on, the evaporated moisture at first causes the upper dome to fog up visibly. But as the load becomes more dry, the upper dome de-fogs, which the user can see as an indication that the clothes are drying. By the time the load is dry, it's moving more quickly and is taking up more room in the upper dome as it fluffs up, almost like popcorn. At the end of the cycle, you open the porthole in front to remove the load.
A few reasons why this wouldn't have caught on in the market. One, depending on the velocity of the air circulation, lighter articles could get stuck to the air exit holes by way of the exiting air pressure (think of something stuck at the end of a vacuum cleaner nozzle). Two, these things would require large boxes to store and ship, so they would take up more space in a warehouse and might also be susceptible to breakage of the dome, both factors adding cost. And less important but still relevant, three, unlike dryers with a flat top surface, you couldn't use the top as a counter or work surface to fold clothes or store a load from the washer before putting it into the dryer.
But even so, it would be an interesting idea to try to resurrect, especially with modern materials for the dome. And of course it could be done in an electric version as well as gas. It would be easy enough to make a scale model of this to test the design principles (particularly the air flow); someone here should try it. The absence of a rotating drum would make it quite simple: only a heater and a high-velocity blower. I'm willing to bet that the air wouldn't even need to be heated super-hot for this to work well; warm might be sufficient. (I'm tempted to build a test model myself, it's so simple; but for the lack of free time...)
Does this sound reasonable, or does anyone else have a guess as to how this works? Or is there patent information available?
Designgeek
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One more thing: there could be a matching washer that used a high-velocity water flow injected from the bottom of the bottom hemisphere, carrying the clothes upward and letting them fall back along the inner circumference. The water exit path would be in a circle around the inlet path, and a lint filter might be provided at that point.
This would be quite a show of splashing etc. under the dome. The difficult part is the spin cycle; presumably the porthole could be relocated upward somewhat to allow the entire bottom hemisphere to spin. Though, the bottom wouldn't be a hemisphere, it might be a shallow cylinder. Hmm... another wild idea to try...
This would be quite a show of splashing etc. under the dome. The difficult part is the spin cycle; presumably the porthole could be relocated upward somewhat to allow the entire bottom hemisphere to spin. Though, the bottom wouldn't be a hemisphere, it might be a shallow cylinder. Hmm... another wild idea to try...
